Shocking News!

[Flipper]

The defense wasn't that bad last year. They played well against Buffalo, Kent, Akron and Toledo and they had a good enough 2nd half against EMU to win the game..

They were horrible against Miami, BC, Tulsa, and most of the second half against Minnesota.

The secondary gets burned mostly when they get a tad aggressive jumping on short routes and bting on run fakes. They also need to improve on that "all or nothing" approach to making the big hit as opposed to the sure tackle.

By and large, by the end of the year, they were playing the run a lot better. Kent ddn't run all over them like people expected and neither did Buffalo or Toledo. Get Davis, Haneline and Schaefer to stay reasonably healthy this year and I think the defense will be, relatively speaking, decent to good.

[JoeFalcon]

Your comment that teams would attack them more if they were that bad is patently false. When a defense is lousy all around opposing coaches will always choose to simply pound them into submission without the inherent risk passing the ball comes with.

So we have horrible cornerbacks vulnerable to surrenduring huge plays and opposing coaches won't attack them? Not bloody likely! Please find me an offensive coordinator these days that would choose 4 yards and a cloud of dust over going after a secondary that's as bad as you claim ours is. The "inherent risk" would be minimal, you'd walk up and down the field and pile up tons of points. If ignoring a weak secondary is indeed part of some grand, cunning gameplanning strategy to control the clock on the part of our opposition as you have intimated, it failed six out of eight times in MAC play.

The defense has had bouts of extreme crappiness, but like Flipper said, they came through at some huge points in the season last year and that shouldn't be overlooked. They bailed out the offense time and time again after turnovers and stalled drives last year.

FWIW, I do think Brandon needs to change his philosophy regarding speed over size for the Front 7. I checked out the LB sizes of the top two run defenses in the MAC last year (Miami and Temple), and they've got some big dudes.

[tiznow]

I am not sure I get the concern for moving players to different positions. A lot of these kids are still growing. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. Agree with Freak, let it play out before we concerened. We are not even to the spring game yet.

[hammb]

Your comment that teams would attack them more if they were that bad is patently false. When a defense is lousy all around opposing coaches will always choose to simply pound them into submission without the inherent risk passing the ball comes with.

So we have horrible cornerbacks vulnerable to surrenduring huge plays and opposing coaches won't attack them? Not bloody likely! Please find me an offensive coordinator these days that would choose 4 yards and a cloud of dust over going after a secondary that's as bad as you claim ours is. The "inherent risk" would be minimal, you'd walk up and down the field and pile up tons of points. If ignoring a weak secondary is indeed part of some grand, cunning gameplanning strategy to control the clock on the part of our opposition as you have intimated, it failed six out of eight times in MAC play.

The defense has had bouts of extreme crappiness, but like Flipper said, they came through at some huge points in the season last year and that shouldn't be overlooked. They bailed out the offense time and time again after turnovers and stalled drives last year.

FWIW, I do think Brandon needs to change his philosophy regarding speed over size for the Front 7. I checked out the LB sizes of the top two run defenses in the MAC last year (Miami and Temple), and they've got some big dudes.

Obviously they did attack them, and had good success when they did. However, it was easier to just rush the ball down our throats in most games. You're looking at the total defensive stats and seeing that our defense must be good against the pass because they were 2nd in the MAC. I say that stat is artificially deflated due to our overall horrendous play against the run. If you want to look at that raw stat and be happy with our pass defense then fine, but the pass rating against would seem to indicate that when teams did attempt to pass on us they did so with great success.

The only reason why our pass defense looks good is because our run defense is so bad that team don't need to pass a whole lot to move the ball on us. It's NOT coincidence. Look across the board in college & NFL stats and you'll find that the teams with lousy pass defenses seem to have much better pass defense. There's a reason for that and it isn't because those teams all have good corners.

[Warthog]

FWIW, I do think Brandon needs to change his philosophy regarding speed over size for the Front 7. I checked out the LB sizes of the top two run defenses in the MAC last year (Miami and Temple), and they've got some big dudes.

I agree. But if we ever had a "big dude" playing LB, he'd get moved to DE.

So despite Flipper's concerns about good sized LBs being available to MAC schools, looks like Miami and Temple might have proved it wrong.

[Flipper]

So despite Flipper's concerns about good sized LBs being available to MAC schools, looks like Miami and Temple might have proved it wrong.

I'm sorry....what?

[Rightupinthere]

Please find me an offensive coordinator these days that would choose 4 yards and a cloud of dust over going after a secondary that's as bad as you claim ours is. The "inherent risk" would be minimal, you'd walk up and down the field and pile up tons of points.

Every

Single

One.

Offensive coordinator is suppose to call out the most effective plays with the least risk. Do this, plus spell the defense. If you're the HC [read: OC's BOSS] of the opposing team, would you go for a fast strike offense and give BG's offense MORE opportunities?

No. You wouldn't. I wouldn't. hammb wouldn't. If BG is giving up nearly FIVE YARDS A CARRY, every O-Coordinator will think "run first; pass when needed."

Every

Single

One.

[JoeFalcon]

Please find me an offensive coordinator these days that would choose 4 yards and a cloud of dust over going after a secondary that's as bad as you claim ours is. The "inherent risk" would be minimal, you'd walk up and down the field and pile up tons of points.

Every

Single

One.

Offensive coordinator is suppose to call out the most effective plays with the least risk. Do this, plus spell the defense. If you're the HC [read: OC's BOSS] of the opposing team, would you go for a fast strike offense and give BG's offense MORE opportunities?

No. You wouldn't. I wouldn't. hammb wouldn't. If BG is giving up nearly FIVE YARDS A CARRY, every O-Coordinator will think "run first; pass when needed."

Every

Single

One.

You would think that such a obvious and sound strategy would work more than two times out of eight against us in the conference. The last time I checked, you win games by scoring points. You could control the clock just as easily by exploiting a weak secondary as well...it's called the West Coast offense.

I'm not saying teams weren't licking their chops to run the ball against us for the reasons cited, but to pretend that coaches could burn Antonio Smith and Kenny Lewis all day and simply choose not to is absurd. If they're genuinely that bad, scheming and ball control goes right out the window in favor of going for the jugular.

[1987alum]

Stanley = hate to say I told you so.

As for the other moves, well, I'm with Freak. Let's see how it works out. Brandon's philosophy seems simple - get the best players on the field at the same time.

[Warthog]

As for the other moves, well, I'm with Freak. Let's see how it works out. Brandon's philosophy seems simple - get the best players on the field at the same time.

I am not going to say I disagree with this philosophy. My issue is with the fact that we cannot/will not recruit good athletes that are already LBs. We bring in an inordinate number of DBs every year and then move them to LB. Why can't we just get decent guys that already play the position?

[Warthog]

Stanley = hate to say I told you so.

Maybe the Stanley situation is still up in the air. The Sentinel article certainly gave me the impression that he was off the team. But Ryan's story in the Blade says he is still just sitting out:
"Cody Basler is working with the first team while John Haneline (injury) and Glen Stanley (academics) sit out the spring."

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dl ... /803300381

[Falconfreak90]

Stanley = hate to say I told you so.

Maybe the Stanley situation is still up in the air. The Sentinel article certainly gave me the impression that he was off the team. But Ryan's story in the Blade says he is still just sitting out:
"Cody Basler is working with the first team while John Haneline (injury) and Glen Stanley (academics) sit out the spring."

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dl ... /803300381

Well, that would be great if Stanely got his academics in order and can play this fall. Reading that article gave me confidence the D unit will be better this year. Giving up 63 points sucked royally and that should be a motivating factor for the D. Of course not all the 63 points should be pinned solely on the D. The offense fumbled 3 times in our own territory and made it very difficult on the D. By the half, there was no doubt they were gassed.

Use it to kick ass in '08....

[Falconboy]

As for the other moves, well, I'm with Freak. Let's see how it works out. Brandon's philosophy seems simple - get the best players on the field at the same time.

I am not going to say I disagree with this philosophy. My issue is with the fact that we cannot/will not recruit good athletes that are already LBs. We bring in an inordinate number of DBs every year and then move them to LB. Why can't we just get decent guys that already play the position?

My thoughts exactly. Really the only real D1 sized LB's we have are Haneline and Basler both over 230 and close to 240 and maybe one or two others. I still for the life of me can't figure out what happened to Brandon Jackson , dude we stole from Ole Miss.

All I know is I've seen enough film, game tape whatever to come to the conclusion in my own mind from what I see that speed over brute strength rarely makes for a better defense in of itself. Speed may help you chase a guy down easier keeping a rb from breaking it all the way but the simple fact is if your chasing down rb's from behind all day cuz your D-lineman are getting decimated and one of your LBs gets taken out by a 250lb TE and the other by an OT getting to the second level cuz no one on the D-line commands a double team, then you've already lost IMO. I say , get the size and strength , especially in the trenches and go ahead and stockpile speed at the OLB positions, the secondary , your rb's and your wideouts.

[Rightupinthere]

Please find me an offensive coordinator these days that would choose 4 yards and a cloud of dust over going after a secondary that's as bad as you claim ours is. The "inherent risk" would be minimal, you'd walk up and down the field and pile up tons of points.

Every

Single

One.

Offensive coordinator is suppose to call out the most effective plays with the least risk. Do this, plus spell the defense. If you're the HC [read: OC's BOSS] of the opposing team, would you go for a fast strike offense and give BG's offense MORE opportunities?

No. You wouldn't. I wouldn't. hammb wouldn't. If BG is giving up nearly FIVE YARDS A CARRY, every O-Coordinator will think "run first; pass when needed."

Every

Single

One.

You would think that such a obvious and sound strategy would work more than two times out of eight against us in the conference. The last time I checked, you win games by scoring points. You could control the clock just as easily by exploiting a weak secondary as well...it's called the West Coast offense.

I'm not saying teams weren't licking their chops to run the ball against us for the reasons cited, but to pretend that coaches could burn Antonio Smith and Kenny Lewis all day and simply choose not to is absurd. If they're genuinely that bad, scheming and ball control goes right out the window in favor of going for the jugular.

Let's just accept that you and I have a different understanding of the game of football and call it a day, shall we? It's fun how the West Coast Offense is thrown around with little understanding as to WHY it was devised [read: defenses got better at STOPPING THE FREAKING RUN].

Gadzooks.

Hello, chicken? Was it you who predated the egg?

[Metz]

You know the pathetic run defense we've seen out of the past 4-5 years and the poor tackling by our linebackers? Prepare to see even worse of the same. Unbelievable.

Optimism from start...love to see it!

I say , get the size and strength , especially in the trenches.

Maybe they got the best size and strength they could. I'm sorry, but there aren't many Warren Sapp's who want to come play at BG. I don't care how big or strong our linemen are, as long as we can hold off the other team enough and score more points, I'm pretty sure we'll be ok.

Yeah we lost bad a few times, but hey, those teams just had their defense playing the same strategy I just mentioned above...hold the opposing offense to less points. I swear it'll work, 100% of the time!!!